No Safe Haven

King of the Jungle

"Isaac, tell me you've got something for me," Victoria said as Isaac Hoover walked in. She was seated at his desk, pouring over the reports from the previous murders. She'd been here for almost two hours now, successfully avoiding Johnson. Not even two minutes ago, she had gotten a text from Hannah that made Victoria glad she had come here to hide; Johnson was indeed on the warpath over their media leak. 

"Detective?" Hoover asked, confused. Behind him, the double-doors swung back and forth; one of the doors creaked as it did so, begging for some grease. 

His confusion made sense to Victoria. If she were a coroner, she wouldn't have expected anyone to be waiting for her at nine in the morning. Well, no one living, that is. 

"If anyone asks, I'm not here," she said as she took her phone from the desk and put it back into her pocket. "Really though, tell me you found something..." 

Hoover removed some latex gloves from a nearby box and sauntered over to his filing cabinets as he put them on. "I already sent over my preliminary findings-" 

"And I already read them. I was hoping you found something since then." Victoria hefted herself out of Hoover's chair and joined him at the filing cabinet. 

"Well, most of what I found, I pointed out at the crime scene... I can give you a more comprehensive run-down, I suppose - if you're up for it." He let the words hang there for a moment while he watched Victoria, concern evident in his darkly intelligent eyes. 

She found his concern touching, and - after last night - she had to ask herself if she was indeed up for it. Whatever Hoover had here couldn't possibly be worse than the grim and distorted display of barbarism she had seen last night, so she gave him an affirmative nod. 

"Okay," he said as he took a file out of the cabinet and started toward the 'catalog'.  

When the bodies of victims came through Hoover's doors, they usually first made their way to his table. After he'd thoroughly examined them, they each got their own little fridge at the back of the room. The wall was separated into twenty-one stainless-steel doors, behind each of them a sliding tray the size of a person.  

In some of them, dead-sicles. While Victoria found the term humorous, she had more than enough sense to ever say so out loud. 

Hoover double-checked a number on his file and opened the corresponding door. Inside, Victoria could discern only a tuft of hair sticking out from under a blue blanket. 

Hoover pulled on the edge of the tray until a majority of it had entered the room. Then he gripped the edge of the blanket and carefully went about uncovering Carter's upper body.  

As inch after inch quickly became visible, Victoria remembered why she had gotten ill the previous night. 

Pieces - that's all that remained of Steven Carter. Sure, you could put them back together in some semblance of a man - as Hoover had done - but Victoria questioned whether or not she should even call these remains by a name. Hoover had rinsed the body after his examination, to prepare it so that family members could identify the remains; but now that the body was no longer in its own unique chamber, Victoria could smell the crime scene all over again. 

It was very unusual for this place to smell bad. Even though it was a morgue, Victoria had never had any problem with the smell. Hoover ran a tight ship; everything was done efficiently and stored properly, minimizing the opportunity for anything to produce a smell. That the cloying smell of decay still remained on the body amazed Victoria. 

She turned to grab her own pair of latex gloves from a box on the wall, then turned back to examine the body for herself. Hoover was obviously hesitant to get into the details until he knew she was okay; examining the body for herself would show Hoover that she was in control and he need not worry.